


make this place your home

by remrose



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Family, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-16
Updated: 2015-05-16
Packaged: 2018-03-30 19:10:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3948337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/remrose/pseuds/remrose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Damian needs help with his homework and also is trying to convince Dick to move back home. But of course, without saying that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short series of works that I initially published on my tumblr back in 2012. AO3 has better readability, so I am transferring them here.

Dick Grayson has mixed feelings on the concept of ‘full circle’.

In a lot of ways, he could see his life as a circle—not that way of the whole life-and-death thing, because he’s seen more death than a mortician and he can’t even remember having held more than two babies in his life—but in that sense that everything that he’s started with, finds its way back into his life again.

There are those little things, where he catches himself remembering how to do little tricks his father taught him, or finding that he still can recall how to properly ride an elephant. Or when he taught Damian how to sharpen the batarangs in nearly the exact same spot Bruce did with him.

Really, the number one thing he considers to be full circle in his life was the time he spent as Batman, leading Robin through Gotham’s dark streets and leaping through the familiar skyline, and a ghost of himself trailing beside them with loud, echoing laughs.

Circling back to Nightwing was almost expected, at this point in his life. It was as close to going in a circle yet again without pulling on the pixie boots. And he probably couldn’t last long with the amount of teasing generated by his scaly underpants (which he totally rocked back then, thank you very much).

Despite everything that makes Damian, he sees so damn much of himself in the kid. But he did with all of the Robins, wearing  _his_  colors with that eager look—muffled or not—facing the world and giddy to leap in with both feet. Sometimes, he just wants to fix their shoulders in his hands and shake his head— _trust me, you’re perfect right where you are—_ because don’t they see there’s no hurry? That being Robin will forever be the best time of their life, and they have to harness it.

“Hello!” Dick answers his phone, leaning on his counter with a spoon of frosted flakes halfway to his mouth.

“ _Grayson.”_  Damian’s steely voice cuts through, and Dick can vividly imagine the not-awkward-but-yeah-totally-awkward pose the ten year old is currently possessing. “ _I have a request.”_

“For what?” Dick asks, dropping his spoon to his bowl and moving to grab his coat. “Anything you want, Little D.”

“ _Before you left, you informed me that I could call upon you for any help I needed—without question.”_

“Of course. Are you at home?” Dick swaps the phone to his left ear long enough to slink into his coat, and grabs his keys.

“ _Without question, Grayson.”_ Damian repeats, and then adds quickly; as if he speaks fast enough Dick won’t hear him. “ _I want you to help me with my health homework.”_

Dick raises an eyebrow briefly before shrugging to himself and continuing on. “Sure thing, Little D, I’ll be right there.”

“ _Tt.”_  Damian hangs up.

Dick doesn’t care, he’s just elated that Damian  _actually_  called him and asked for help. That fact alone is means for celebration. He cheerfully arrives at the manor, accepting a warm greeting from Titus while Damian stands behind the dog, arms crossed and scowling.

“Aw, don’t think I’ve forgotten you, Little D.” Dick swoops to his feet, the perfected art of  _stealing a quick snuggle from the dangerous child assassin_ , earning at least a 50 millisecond cuddle before Damian expertly twists out of the hold. Dick likes to think Damian enjoyed that fraction of a second, even if he won’t admit it.

“Is behaving like an adult beyond your capacity, Grayson?” Damian snaps, and Dick can tell by the slight pink of his high cheekbones that whatever this homework is has really riled him up.

“Easy, kiddo.” Dick holds his palms up in surrender. “Now, let’s see what you need help with.”

The scowl deepens. “It is preposterous. I would ignore it completely, if it wasn’t for the fact that my imbecile teacher has threatened to have me fail health if I do not complete the assignment.”

Dick follows him to the library, hands casually in his pockets while he tries to pretend like he belongs here, and that his heart isn’t thumping just a little harder in his chest. He can no longer tell if he misses the manor, or if he misses the feelings the manor used to give him.

Damian has his schoolbag leaning neatly against his chair, papers on the table with a pencil. Dick curiously picks up the top one, skimming the words.

“ _Healthy Relationships.”_  Dick reads out loud, raising an eyebrow. “ _Draw your family tree and write what each of them means to you. Full color.”_

“Have I returned to preschool?” Damian demands, glaring at the paper.

“I think it’s a good idea.” His older brother tells him, gesturing for Damian to sit in the chair while sitting on the desk himself. “Not the family tree thing, that’s an overused concept, but being forced to do something you don’t want to. Builds character.”

“I have plenty of character. I have more than everyone in my class, including the teacher.” Damian stubbornly replies, not sitting down.

“Never hurts to have more.” Dick says cheerfully, sliding a blank page towards him. “Start with yourself.”

Narrowing his eyes, Damian takes the pencil into his grasp, writing ‘ _Damian’_  right in the middle of the page.

“You’re supposed to draw yourself, too.” Dick adds happily.

Damian demonstrates his lethal glare, and draws a smooth circle, with two eyes, a small nose, line for a month and short black hair. Dick thinks it has a surprising likeness.

“There.” Damian looks like he’d rather like to toss this paper in the fire. “Satisfactory?”

“You bet.” Dick ruffles his hair, and his little brother scowls. “Now Bruce.”

The child looks like he might argue, but Dick just smiles infuriatingly, so Damian writes ‘ _Bruce’_  and draws a near-identical head, except with slightly longer hair. He murmurs once or twice about wishing he’d never asked for his help, earning a chuckle from Dick.

Without being prompted, ‘ _Talia’_ is placed next to Bruce and above Damian, a simple face with long hair.

“There.” Damian says. “I’m done.”

Dick laughs and shakes his head. “Not even close, Little D. Now me, Jay, Tim and Cass.”

Damian furrows his brow. “None of you are related to me.”

His older brother gives him a long look, and appears just a little sad. “Family is so much more than blood, Dami, you should know that.”

Damian blinks, and sets a frown on his face before adding ‘ _Richard’, ‘Jason’, ‘Timothy’_ and  _‘Cassandra’_  below his name.

“Better put Alfred on there too.” Dick says helpfully, pointing above Bruce. Damian opens his mouth to argue, and Dick continues, “Do you want help or not? You can’t forget Alfred, Dami.”

Alfred is added, and Damian gives each of the new additions little heads—Dick with long hair, Jason with a little streak of grey, Tim with bangs, Cass with slightly feminine lips and Alfred with the moustache.

Damian looks at the paper in distaste. “This is a ridiculous exercise.”

“I think you did great.” Dick says tenderly, earning a side glance from his brother. “Now, you’re supposed to write what each of them means to you.”

“No.” Damian replies frankly. “The teacher will live.”

“Aw, Dami…”

“Master Damian,” Alfred leans into the library, eyes settling on Dick before his lips turn up at the corners. “Supper is almost ready. Are you staying, Master Richard?”

“Yes, he is.” Damian says dismissively, ignoring the way Dick had been opening his mouth to answer. “Now help me color.”

Alfred looks to Dick, who shrugs good-naturedly and takes a pencil crayon from Damian.

At supper, Dick finds himself trying to desperately pretend like this is a normal occurrence, smiling and laughing for Damian who seems to be secretly (under the layers of quiet sullenness) pleased with his continued presence. Bruce doesn’t come to the table until the brothers had been eating for almost seven minutes, noticing Dick but not pausing his stride, taking a seat and accepting his food. “Good evening boys.”

“Hey B.” Dick grins, his heart flipping and betraying the easy emotions on his face. It shouldn’t be this nerve wracking to come home.

“Hello Father.” Damian says, eyes flickering up almost nervously, waiting for how Bruce would play this situation.

Bruce doesn’t hesitate to eat, to be seated the exact same way Dick had watched him for his entire childhood.

“How was your week, Dick?” Bruce asks, taking a sip from his glass and looking at his oldest son. Dick knows the look, it is quiet appreciation. Very quiet, mind you, but Dick had seen it before, and it causes the same flutters of bubbly warmth in his stomach as it always does. He smiles brightly, realizing that he didn’t miss the manor, or the feelings the manor gave him, but he missed Bruce and he missed Damian.

Dick happily explains his ventures of the week, prodding Damian at the end and asking him what he’s been up to—earning a prim explanation of events. Dick manages to get the three of them in a civil, almost warm conversation by the end of the meal, cementing his feelings. He missed the two of them, but the problem is, they’ve been here the whole time, and Dick knows he’s been selfish and stubborn. But now he doesn’t know what to do with himself and his surfacing feelings, so he does nothing.

They’re sitting together still, plates cleaned, and Bruce says, “I’m glad you’re here.” Before Dick can grasp the statement, he continues: “I want your input on a report.”

Bruce stands, and Dick follows him to the cave, Damian at his side. He can’t decide if the two sentences are connected or separate.

He decides it doesn’t matter.

[]

“ _Grayson, in the interest of keeping my teacher satisfied, I request you assist me with my latest health assignment. It involves identifying emotions and I cannot pretend to care enough to do a proper job, so your everlasting cheerfulness comes in handy for these situations.”_

Dick smiles at his phone, the message ended by Damian hanging up without saying goodbye. He’s already getting ready to head to the manor, not even bothering to stop at his own place.

“ _Anna is pushed off the swings at school by her friend Nicole. How might she feel towards Nicole?”_  Dick reads out loud, the two of them seated in the sitting room, Damian’s arms crossed and refusing to even read the ‘pointless’ questions himself.

“Who cares?” Damian replies.

Dick snorts, elbowing his little brother. “How you even pass any of your classes, anyway?”

“A lot of patience.” Damian snarls.

“Aha. Oh, and how’d you do on the family tree thing?” 

Damian’s fingers curl slightly, a cue Dick knows is his way of expressing discomfort. “I did well.”

“Great! Now, answer the question and maybe we can manage to not piss off your teacher any more than we have to.” Dick says cheerfully.

“The girl would feel inferior for allowing herself to be pushed around.” Damian answers moodily after a couple moments.

Dick forces him to write that down.

Alfred comes later, much the same as the night before, and Damian once again implies that Dick is staying without question. He even ends up staying the night, asleep in his own bed and staring at the walls, thinking that he needed to get more of his own stuff in here again.

It was a slippery slope from there.

Four nights in a row Damian calls for ‘help’ on his health homework, and after that Dick just comes straight to the manor in the evenings without being asked. It’s so easy to fall back into the routine, into their household. To move back home. His clothes migrate back into his room, his vehicles fill the garage again, Alfred automatically sets a place for him and Bruce is… lighter. Damian seems almost pleased with himself, smirking when he sees Dick waiting for him, to help him do the silly worksheets his fifth grade teacher assigns ‘just to spite him’. Like he’s done everyone a favour by manoeuvring Dick back home.

Dick realizes it, very suddenly, when he’s out on patrol. By himself, of course, but Batman and Robin are in his comm. link, keeping to themselves and fighting Clayface. They’ve cleaned up and Dick is on a stakeout by himself, when Robin addresses him through the comm.

“ _Will you be returning home afterwards, Nightwing?”_

He lifts a hand to activate his comm. and answer, when it hits him, with a real clarity, that he’s moved back into the manor.  _He’s moved back into the manor._

“No, not tonight.” Dick replies slowly and quietly, not to alert the people he’s staking out. Robin doesn’t reply after that.

Later, running his hand under a tap and watching the blood wash from a silly injury away, standing in  _his_  apartment. He can’t decide what to do. He’d basically invited himself back to the manor— _but Damian had been pulling the strings, he_ wanted _him home—_ yet he’s not sure why. He doesn’t know why he returned, and now he’s not sure why he left, and why he’s staying away now.

So he stays away, because it’s easy. Damian is sullen and moody whenever he speaks with him—but what’s new. He asks for help with an assignment and Dick claims he’s got work, got patrol, and has anything else. Damian stops asking after the second night.

No, because on the third night, he appears at his door. All child and short, with a drawn up hoodie and sneakers. “Grayson.”

“Damian.” Dick says in surprise, inwardly cursing himself. Of course Damian wouldn’t just let this go.

“I tried being subtle, but obviously that wasn’t enough to get through your thick head.” Damian crosses his arms and narrows his icy blue eyes. “Father is unbearable without you. Return home, this is ridiculous behaviour between you both.”

Leave it to Damian to make it sound like it was anything other than his own wants fuelling his request.

“Da—“

“If it is because you do not want to, doing things you do not want to do builds character.” Damian tells him, quite cheekily for him. “You can never get enough character.”

Dick actually laughs, because yeah,  _he said that._

“You are coming home.” Damian manages to make it sound like he is doing Dick a great favour.

“I’ll think about it, okay?” Dick relents, ruffling Damian’s hair and grinning when he doesn’t pull away for at least 2.5 seconds.

He thinks about it, and he knows he’s just been dodging the feelings, what he really wants, because he’s afraid of the full circle again. That he’ll go home and he’ll leave again, because his life is one god-damn circle, and it always returns to where he doesn’t want it to.  But maybe, for Damian, it’s a risk he’ll take.

[]

He’s sitting, head bowed, in front of the computer, working. His hair is ruffled up one side, cold coffee next to him. It’s late. Bruce is getting up, brushing past his oldest son, and speaking without turning.

“I’m happy you’re home.”

Dick smiles to himself, there is no mistaking the sentence, nothing following it. Bruce is already gone and if the words weren’t echoing in his head, he might’ve imagined them.


	2. Chapter 2

Nothing’s changed, really.

At least, Jason doesn’t think so.

Okay, so the last time he got knocked out in a fight, he woke up in the Batcave. Dick was cheerfully waiting in a hard chair beside him and updated him on the crook he’d been fighting with. Bruce is there, but he’s at the computer, back to Jason.

“Yeah, great.” Jason says in response to the long input from Dick (when did he even move back into the manor, anyway?) “I’m outta here.”

“Aw, Jay, you’re hurt.” Dick pouts slightly, standing up. “Just stay the night.”

Jason  _laughs._  “I’m sure B would  _love_  that.”

“You’re always welcome here, Jay, whether or not you think so.” Dick tells him, while Bruce is still silent.

“In your opinion.” the second Robin says, and snatches up his helmet before escaping. Before he can inevitably hear Bruce deny the offer he didn’t even want.

He knows Dick is just saying that. He knows Bruce would never want him home again. He knows a lot of things, and a couple them he blocks out. Like the time Bruce saved him from a grenade he hadn’t caught, swooping in like the  _god damn Batman_  and whisking him to safety, disappearing almost before Jason could realize who he was. But, being raised by the man, he caught the tip of his cape swooping around the corner, and his heart jumped. He hates how his heart jumps.

But nothing’s changed.

Dick starts to find him nearly every patrol, helping him out (frowning at his methods), roping him into coming to some Bat thing—with Bruce right there, not saying a word otherwise, or to him—and poking him to visit the cave. He never accepts, disappearing instead. Nothing’s changed, he tells himself, watching Dick sulk and return home, nothing is different now.

Then Bruce starts addressing him—when Dick tugs him along to a Bat-mission—starts telling him to do parts of the job, and Jason responds as is expected. Snarky, sarcastic, but will probably get his part done. He doesn’t show is how it stuns him, without fail, every time Bruce talks to him like a normal human being. Like nothing’s changed.

Despite this, Dick still can’t convince him to come to the cave. The first Robin is opening asking now, trying to lead him towards it—which doesn’t work, with who the two of them are—and the only times he ends up there surrounded by bats is if he gets knocked out.

Knowing all of this—all of those unresolved feelings, all of the unspoken feelings (is it love? Is it hate? Is it indifference,  _goddammit talk to me, Bruce!)_  –all of the requests to just come and stay at home for a while from Dick, and the way Bruce never disagrees with the offers (but never accepts either)—you’d think it was Dick or even  _Bruce_ who would ultimately convince him to come home.

It wasn’t.

_This is the last time,_ Jason promises himself, not for the first time, _I refuse to wake up in the manor again. I refuse to let Dick and Bruce toy with me._

He’s on a gurney, head pounding and mouth feeling like it’s been scrubbed with cotton. His mask is off, his helmet discarded, an itchy rash on his arm and a throbbing cut on the back of his head. It’s dark, it’s vaguely chilled, but _damn if it doesn’t feel like home._

Jason swears quietly under his breath, wanting a smoke, and wanting a lot of other things he’d rather not put a name to.

“You should take Master Richard up on his offers.” Alfred is standing next to him, picking up the red helmet and placing it on the gurney. Jason knew he’d been coming—he can’t turn off his bat-instinct even if he wanted to—but hedidn’t attempt to flee. Under heavy torture, he wouldn’t admit it, but there is one thing he’d never wanted to do in his life, and that was disappoint Alfred.

Bruce, Dick and the kid are upstairs, he assumes. He wonders what time it is.

“What time is it?”

“Seven-thirty in the morning.“ Alfred answers, and then adds on the same tangent as before. "He’s not asking for fun, you know. He really wants you to come home.”

Jason snorts, trying to sit up and earning wicked vertigo. Alfred tsks to himself, placing a gentle hand on Jason’s shoulder, leading him back down.

He allows it, making a slight face. “I want a smoke.”

Alfred doesn’t reply to that, moving around him and playing with the IV he hadn’t realized was stuck in his arm. “Of course, Master Bruce would like you to return as well, but he is much too stubborn to say so.” Alfred fixes him with an even look. “I like to think you picked that up from him.”

Jason fiercely ignores the wrenching in his heart. “Bruce can go fuck himself.”

Alfred raises an eyebrow and gives the second Robin a patented stare, guaranteed to invoke guilt (or your money back). Jason winces internally, having almost forgotten how it felt to be on the receiving end of that look.

“Demonstrating your stubborn streak is not necessary, Master Jason.” Alfred is impassive again, standing beside him. “You are always welcome here, whether or not you believe so. If Bruce has a problem with it, which he does not, he can take it up with me.”

Jason raises an eyebrow at that. “You want me here? Really?” he laughs, sounding incredulous.

“I do.” The other replies sincerely. “In fact, I would like to strike up an offer with you.”

The second Robin takes a moment because he is busy trying to swallow the butterflies having a riot in his stomach. “An offer?”

“Yes. For every time you come to the manor without being forced or unconscious, you will find fresh cookies in the third drawer from the fridge.” Alfred says primly.

Jason simply blinks, and then laughs spottily for a couple moments, looking almost disbelievingly at the butler. “You know, most people call that a  _bribe._ ”

“It is what it is, Master Jason. Trust me when I say no one in this house will turn you away.” Alfred taps the IV, and looks just  _tiniest_  bit smug. “Have a nice rest.”

“Yeah.” Jason says. “I still want a smoke.”

Alfred ignores him, walking calmly up the stairs.

He doesn’t know if Bruce or Dick came down to see him after that, because he left the moment Alfred’s footsteps faded.

[]

Damn it if Jason doesn’t have the worst craving for Alfred’s cookies for the next week straight.

[]

He doesn’t go to the manor. He stays as far away from the entire Bat family as he can, doing whatever the hell he wants and not caring. Desperately not caring.

Jason hears through the rumour mill. Some lucky guy got a stab on Nightwing, got him in the back. Stabbed in the fucking back. Vivid images collect in Jason’s mind.  _Dick, smiling, laughing, asking him to come home. Every bloody stabbing he’d ever witnessed, the sound it makes, the cry the victim releases. Blood, leaking, a crowbar—_

It isn’t hard to hunt down the motherfucker, to kill him. Well, it wouldn’t have been hard. Jason found him, had him pissing himself in a warehouse, whimpering and quivering with gross sniffles of snot. The gun is level, drawn, and he hesitates. He fires, and the bullet buries itself in the concrete next to his head. He turns around and leaves without looking back.

He hasn’t gone soft. Nothing’s changed. He knows, twenty minutes later, Robin shoves the same guy he had shaking on the end of his gun earlier into a police car. He doesn’t care. And he doesn’t go to the manor.

[]

Since Nightwing isn’t out to patrol for the next couple weeks, Jason doesn’t have to speak with any of them. Nothing’s changed, and he knows it all too well.

A good night goes bad. He’s burning hot, sweat pouring down his face inside the helmet, mouth stinging. Ivy bats his helmet off like it’s nothing, and he’s exposed to the toxin that he’d been keeping at bay with his filter until that moment—only barely, it was beginning to oversaturated the air. She licks her lips, looking wild and untamed, and Jason knows he’s got three minutes—minimum—before whatever her toxin happens to be races through his system and leaves him helpless.

A couple minutes of frantic limbs, a handful of gunshots and more tentacles than Jason was really comfortable with, he didn’t take her down, but he got away.

His feet fumble, and he knows instantly that the aftermath of the toxin isn’t going to be good. His feet don’t fumble—they kick, they tromp and they smash but never such a klutz action, even in the height of exhaustion.

Flickering through his brain before he can cease it— _I wish Bruce would help me—_ he spitefully suffocates the childish want, and collapses into his apartment. You don’t get any more ‘shithole’ than this, with water that doesn’t always run, garbage that almost never gets properly taken away, heat that never works except in the summer and of course that constant questionable sounds radiating from other rooms.

Jason’s weak knees give out right in front of his ratty couch—dark-white that used to be bright-white, cushion missing and two bullet holes ( _he doesn’t want to talk about it)_ —a harsh swallow the only outward physical sign of any discomfort. In reality, his limbs are tingling like spiders are racing through his veins and a vivid light-sensitive headache is a pick-axe to the eye.

Before he can think ‘ _uh-oh’_ , he falls unconscious.

Despite anything he might’ve claimed prior, Jason actually can’t remember his own death. Sure, he remembers the crowbar, and half the shit the Joker said, but not dying.

Well, he couldn’t remember  _before._  In the thick, sludge like unconscious sleep that feels like fifty tonnes of rock over his chest, he remembers dying. And he continues to remember, trapped in a trance for endless amounts of time, the feel of his own breathless body and  _death._

Yeah. Not one of his best nights. Makes the top ten, at least (and that’s saying something, with him).

No one comes to save him, no one strokes his hair and he is craving Alfred’s cookies again, leaning against his counter only half-awake from the horrible trance, hands shaking.

“I am really fucked up.” He tells his toaster. The toaster doesn’t reply, but it does wink.

That’s when Jason decides he needs another day in bed.

[]

He can’t think of any reason to go to the manor—any valid reason or any excuse at all (he blames the toxin for his delayed thinking)—so he vaguely decides to go there and sleep on their couch, because it sure it more comfy than his with the ferret urine under the third cushion ( _it’s a really long story)_.

It is so insanely easy to do so. He sneaks in the window, kicks off his shoes and falls onto the soft couch. It smells exactly like he remembered, and it’s that just-below-lukewarm temperature that his apartment couldn’t dream of replicating. He dozes on the couch almost happily, grey streak of hair falling in his eyes and shading them from anyone who might walk past (not that Jason wouldn’t hear them).

Because the universe loves to spite him, it’s Bruce who walks by first. Jason knows the footsteps of mere sound, already so close to sleep it’s effortless to remain placid. Bruce doesn’t hesitate his stride, doesn’t falter—Jason knows he sees him, he can’t have missed him,  _he’s Batman—_ and then there is a blanket folded over him. If he wasn’t so focused on pretending to sleep, his jaw would’ve dropped.  _That did not just happen._

Bruce leaves. That just happened.

Later, the cookies are exactly where Alfred said they would be, steaming slightly and closed up in a Tupperware container. He takes them back to his apartment and eats them.

Nothing’s changed. He tells himself that because the cookies taste the exact same they did years ago.

Maybe he goes to the manor, sometimes, not for Dick or Bruce or even Alfred.  Nothing has changed, and that includes his desire to be home.


	3. Chapter 3

People assume a lot about Timothy Drake.

Those who don’t know him, those who see him in the tabloids, assume he’s just like Brucie. That he was adopted solely for the money.

There are superhero acquaintances who assume he’s  _that hardcore_   _all the time_ , or that there’s some snivelling child underneath his exterior, or that he’s insane.

Then there are his friends, who assume he’ll turn around someday and notice that they  _care_ about him, and it’s not because they have to.

Finally, his family, who assumed Tim would be the easiest to convince to return home.

[]

Tim really, really wants a decent cup of coffee.

It’s that kind of caffeine craving that makes you either want to snap at someone until they realize you’re being a whiny-bitch because you’re depraved of sweet sugared coffee, or buy an entire coffee shop so there can be a steaming cup in your hand,  _now._

At the moment, there is no one to snap at and somehow he doesn’t think there is a reasonable ground to buy a coffee shop, so he continues to tap away at his keyboard while the irrational want for coffee grows instead of fades.

He’s been busy. He has seven projects on the go, and that’s just with WE. As well, there are four cases, two investigations and one incident with a rogue snake that  _he is totally going to deal with, okay?_  To top it off, his coffee maker broke three days ago and he is stuck with either trudging over to Starbucks and standing in line, or pawning it off of WE employees. It’s really, a low priority on his life right now, but it’s extremely annoying so he’s allowed to sulk about it.

Things on the  _high_ priority of his life outside of the before-mentioned projects are the fact that Dick appears to have moved back into the manor, as well as Jason (although on a spottier schedule). He’s not sure why it affects him, or why his brain decides to nearly obsess over it constantly, but it does and he does.

He hears Dick come in, his footsteps so carefully light that if he were anyone but a bat Dick would have been able to sneak up on him.

“Good morning Babybird.”

Two things cross Tim’s mind as he turns in the chair. One,  _oh wow it’s morning no wonder I want coffee so badly_ , and two,  _wait so why is Dick here._

As it happens, neither of those things matter, because Dick has coffee and Tim is reminded of how he’s the  _greatest person ever of ever._

“Gimme.” Tim articulates, taking three long sips before he speaks again. “How do you always know? Seriously. I—you know, nevermind. I don’t want to know how you have this sixth sense for when I need something, it’ll ruin it.”

“It comes with being an older brother.” Dick winks.

“Mhmm. So tell me,” Tim leans back in his chair while Dick hops on his table (making Tim wince very slightly as his brother crumples his work). “How sad is it that I consider buying a cafe as a higher possibility than walking to Starbucks.”

“Money can’t buy happiness, Babybird.” Dick replies amusedly, reaching to ruffle his hair and having Tim swat at his hand.

“It can buy coffee, which is pretty much the same thing.” Tim says, sipping the scalding hot drink from heaven. “Thanks Dick.”

“No prob!” he chirps, kicking his dangling feet like a child. “Did you get my message, or are you ignoring me on purpose?”

Tim raises an eyebrow, slips out his phone and scrolls through the twenty messages, and sure enough, Dick sent him one two days ago. “I’ve been busy.” He scans it minutely, taking a quick sip. “Thanks for the offer, but no, I’m good.”

“No?” Dick actually sounds surprised, which confuses Tim and makes him glance up. “Why not?” Dick adds.

The third Robin gives him a slightly strange look. “Dick, I can’t come home. I know you’ve got this gung-ho urge to make us a functioning family and drive us all to Disney World, but I’ve got a life and I don’t belong at the manor anymore.”

Dick looks sad now. “That’s not true. You  _always_  belong at the manor.”

Tim just shrugs, spinning back to his computer and typing away in quick succession, fingertips still vaguely warm from the coffee.

His older brother doesn’t leave, so he looks up (craning his neck just a little because  _he’s sitting on his desk)_  and raises an eyebrow. “Anything else, Dick?”

Dick hugs him, unexpected and tight, so Tim is left awkwardly patting his arm and getting a noseful of Dick’s distinct cologne that makes him think of the times when he was younger he’d sneak into his empty bed and it would reek of that smell.

“Are you okay?” Tim asks his clingy brother.

“Yeah.” Dick says into his hair.

He still doesn’t let go. Tim is itching to take another sip of coffee and get back to work  _(the thing with the rouge snake will be dealt with, okay?_ ) but Dick is startlingly persistent.

“You know I love you, right? That we all do?” His brother feels the need to inform him, making Tim twitch awkwardly and desperately want to escape (and hide in a closet like he used when he was a child, lining up his toys and pretending that someone was looking for him).

But he knows Dick is just saying that, so he makes a noise of agreement and tries to untangle himself from the octopus he calls a brother.

“Dick, you’re crushing me.” Tim tells him sternly, Dick’s knee in his chest proving a counter-attack on a certain function he calls  _breathing_.

“Spoilsport.” Dick ruffles his hair—not that it matters at this point, since he needs a shower because apparently it’s _morning_  (seriously, when did that happen?)—and releases him.

“Are you done being a sap now? Can I get back to work?” Tim asks, flexing his fingers in anticipation.

“Shouldn’t you go to bed?” Dick suggests evenly, pushing at Tim’s desk chair and making it spin. His younger brother makes unamused faces at him as he spins around.

“What time is it?” he says finally, stopping Dick with a foot.

“Eleven thirteen AM.” Dick cheerfully answers.

Tim blinks once or twice. “Aha. No, I’ve got too many things to do before sleep.”

Dick opens his mouth to protest again, shuts it and grins. “Okay, whatever you say. Later, Babybird!”

Tim narrows his eyes in suspicion. “Bye Dick.”

He works on his cases, and deals with the thing with the rogue snake, and then goes to bed. He pauses before shutting his bedroom door, quietly setting a thin wire trap. He isn’t a detective for nothing, and the willingness Dick proposed this morning makes him think that he was just waiting for him to sleep so he could do… something. He hasn’t figured that part out yet.

Falling asleep while alert—a class A bat-trick where you’re totally asleep but if a bug moves anywhere in the room, you pin it with a batarang—proves to have been the right choice when he’s been asleep for fifteen minutes, and he hears the silent movements of Dick sneaking into his apartment.

_Seriously_ , Tim thinks sleepily, wondering what the hell his brother is up to. Dick, predictably, pulls open his door without a sound and trips over his trip wire.

“Why would you break into my place and then not even look for traps.” Tim asks, propping himself up on his elbows.

“Ow.” Dick replies.

“What do you want, Dick?”

“I was going to kidnap you.” Dick says into the carpet.

Tim blinks, and then rubs his blue eyes. “And how’s that working out for you?”

“Not so good. I was kinda hoping you’d be asleep and I could take you home.”

“I am home.” Tim throws a pillow at his brother. “Go away now.”

He feels Dick staring at him, and it makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He’d throw another pillow at him to make him stop, but then he’d have no pillow.

“Can you please stop being such a creeper?” Tim asks exhaustedly.

“If you come home.” Dick replies stubbornly.

Tim groans loudly. “I’ll come visit, okay?”

“Okay!” Dick chirps with cheer, hopping up and bringing him the pillow back. Tim pointedly ignores him, but Dick still smoothes back his bangs to press a kiss to his forehead and happily tug his covers higher on his chin like a child. Betraying emotion coils in Tim’s chest, and he makes no indication to his brother, who leaves quickly after.

He pretends to forget about the conversation for three days. On the fourth, Dick texts him, ‘ _Supper, tonight. I know where you sleep.’_

Tim stares at his phone, contemplating the fifteen excuses he thought of the second he read the text. Some of them are even valid enough that Dick might leave him alone. But he’d just resort to another scheme, another day to get him at the manor with his delusional vision of family.

‘ _Yeah.’_  Tim replies slowly, pressing send before he can change his mind.

So he goes to the manor. He tries very hard to not expect anything in particular, and yet he still manages to be surprised.

It’s six o’clock on a Thursday. This calls for Bruce being holed up either in a meeting, in the cave, or just generally by himself. As far as he remembers, this is the time where Damian trains before dinner, and when Dick was home he used to use this period to do whatever he wanted, usually alone.

Jason is sitting on the back of the couch, wearing his leather jacket but his shoes are off. He has a container of cookies and appears to be teasing Damian with them. The demon child himself is on the couch, on a laptop and snapping off insults to Jason. Dick is sitting next to Damian, alternating between helping Damian with whatever he’s doing on the computer, playing Grand Theft Auto 4 on the giant TV and trying to steal cookies when Jason isn’t paying attention. Tim could almost deal with all of that, but the real kicker is Bruce, sitting in an armchair filling out paperwork. Not talking to the others, no, but he’s in the same room, and that’s more than they’ve gotten from him in a while.

Tim efficiently slips off his coat and knocks off his sneakers; head ducked just a little and bangs hanging in his blue eyes. Immediately, the overwhelming feeling of  _being out of place_  takes over, making his skin crawl a little and the urge to turn-and-leave bubbling under the surface.

“Babybird!” Dick grins, leaping over the back of the couch easily—Jason withdrawing slightly to give him room and scowling at his brother’s back—and tangling Tim in another hug that instantly reminds him of an octopus. “You’re here!”

“Hey Dick.” Tim says, eyes flickering over his shoulder. The rest of his them have varying expressions, but not the ones Tim was expecting. Damian is tame irritation, Jason is something that Tim is hesitant to call anticipation, and Bruce is… Bruce.

With a family like theirs, Tim wonders why Dick tries so hard sometimes.

“Great, Drake is here.” Damian says dryly, looking like he’d say more but Dick sends him a warning glare. “Quit being a freak, Grayson, and continue helping me with this.”

Dick drags Tim over to the couch, making him sit on the other side of him while he helps Damian with something that looks like a school project on Healthy Lifestyles.

Behind him, Jason is playing with an iPod, making it play muffled music through the light bickering of Damian and Dick. Tim, despite himself, leans back so he can see the iPod screen, watching Jason scroll through songs. He has a lot, something over three thousand, so Tim just scans the tiny screen for a long time, the family sitting together without arguing in the first time in… ever.

“Semisonic?” Jason asks, his finger hovering over ‘Closing Time’. It takes Tim a moment to realize that Jason is actually asking his opinion.

“Yeah.”

Dick perks up when he hears it come on, and Jason kicks his head half-heartedly. “No singing, Dickiebird.”

“That should be a rule.” Damian agrees with an eye roll.

“ _Every new beginning comes some other beginning’s end.”_  Dick sings really quietly. Damian elbows him at the same moment Jason kicks him again and Tim whacks his arm.

Dick pouts.

“You should add that people should stretch before exercise.” Tim suggests softly to Damian, unable to avoid reading his project— _it’s about Healthy Living. Tim is the picture you see in the dictionary next to that phrase._

“I don’t need your help, Drake.” Damian sneers, and after a moment, he adds it to the project.

Alfred draws into the room, looking pleased at the people within—very slightly, of course. “Supper is ready.”

Jason rolls off the back of the couch and cuts off his music. Damian saves his work, Bruce marks his page, and Dick bounces to his feet, doing only one handspring on his way out of the room.

“You get used to it again.” Jason says, just as Tim realizes it’s only the two of them, and then before Tim can decide what that’s supposed to mean, Jason is disappearing down the hallway.

Tim is quick to follow. Bruce is at the head of the table, of course, with Dick and Damian on either side of him. Jason—thankfully—takes the spot next to Damian so Tim quickly sits next to Dick.

Tim had truly forgotten how Dick can bring conversations to life, even with the room filled with the three of the surliest people he knew. Jason is quick to fill in with wit and sarcasm, and Damian always ready to insult or remark scathingly. Bruce does speak very obviously the most to Dick out of the four of them, but the amount is still an improvement over past times.

All in all, it was… surprising. Tim was genuinely confused and displaced with the shift in the situation at the manor, and if anything it made him want to stay away more. It was obvious Damian still wanted nothing to do with him (not that Tim was particularly interested that they pick up their adopted brotherhood either) and Bruce was almost indifferent to his presence. Beyond Dick being a cuddle octopus, which is nothing unusual, Jason was the most surprising. He was almost relaxed, confidant in his place in the family—despite that aura, Tim was sure it was just what Jason wanted to project, not what he was actually feeling. Tim could see the way Bruce still wouldn’t meet his eyes.

It was just a tad suffocating, and he slipped away after supper when Damian and Dick fell back into the project, Bruce disappeared and Jason was having a quiet arguement with the toaster (or something). He patrolled by himself, went to bed by himself, and felt those bugs under his skin remain for the rest of the day, the feel and smell of the manor following him everywhere.

He is pleased when Dick doesn’t try to get him to come home again (ignoring the pangs in his stomach that must just be the leftover adrenaline from that rouge lemur and not disappointment).

And then later he eats some cooked octopus just to be childishly spiteful.


	4. Chapter 4

“You’re an asshole.”

Bruce doesn’t look up from his work. “What do you need, Dick?”

Dick has his hands on his hips, looking thoroughly sassy with his dark bangs hanging in his bright eyes. “Bruce, do you even care?”

“What are we talking about?” Bruce rubs his temple.

“Tim. He should be here, with us. But he’s not, and it’s your fault.” Dick tells him.

“If Tim wants to be on his own, that’s his choice.” Bruce replies thinly.

“No, he thinks he doesn’t belong in this family. And I’ve tried to convince him otherwise, but it’s not working. I want you to tell him to come home.”

Bruce gives him a level look, and Dick returns it fearlessly. After a couple moments Bruce inclines his chin slightly and says, “I can talk to him.”

“Thank you.” Dick grins.

[]

Okay, that didn’t happen.

But in hindsight, it’s what he  _should’ve_ done.

[]

Tim is getting really good at evading Dick.

It’s almost worrying, making the older purse his lips with yet another brush-off, a shrug and a missed phone-call. He had thought that the supper at the manor had gone well, he had thought that Tim might come home. Dick doesn’t know where he went wrong with that.

With Jason, he likes to pretend that he doesn’t spend every other night at home, that he’s doing everyone a favour by being there when he does. It’s so opposite with Tim it almost hurts. Dick honestly doesn’t know what to do with him, and it leaves this little breathless feeling in his chest when he knows that being a big brother isn’t enough this time, that he can’t just make this magically disappear.

He should’ve made Tim come home first.

Dick has one more chance, one more attempt under his sleeve. The key part is that Tim has to call Dick, and not the other way around. Normally, this could be at least a couple weeks or months, but Dick may have made it necessary for him to call since the current investigation he’s working on references one of Dick’s earliest missions as Robin, and you need a special access code for those. Well, Tim usually has those codes, but Dick may have changed them early to give him reason to call. Same thing.

Tim, enviably, calls. Dick willingly gives him the code.

“So can I get one last chance to convince you to come home?” Dick asks as casually as he can, hanging upside-down from his legs hooked on the top shelf in the safety of his room in the manor.

“ _Is it really necessary, Dick?”_

“Come on. Anyway, so Bruce told me he wants you to come home.”

“ _What?”_

“He did. And I want you to, and I’m pretty Jason does—not that I’ve asked, but you know how it is—and there’s Damian who will survive in your presence despite what he might say otherwise.” Dick adds on quickly, neck hot from the original lie—he hasn’t spoken a word to Bruce about Tim, but he’s pretty sure Bruce would say yes if he did, so it’s moot.

“ _I’ll think about it, okay?”_  Tim replies slowly, voice just a slight bit different.

“That’s all I ask.” Dick amends happily. “Have a good night, Babybird.”

“ _Night Dick.”_

Dick hangs up the phone, flipping off his shelf and landing silently, giggling very slightly to himself. “ _NightDick, Nightwing…”_

He is unreasonably pleased when Tim comes and has supper with them two days later, looking awkward but still straight-backed and quiet. Jason seems to enjoy his company, trying to elbow him into the conversations. Damian, on the other hand, is not pleased, being just tad more grumbling and stabbing at his potatoes with a frown. Bruce makes no indication that nothing’s changed, and a slight flare chokes Dick’s throat, wanting to shove the two into a locked room so they could speak for more than three seconds.

_Your family is all around you, Bruce!_  Dick wants to shout. _Look up and notice!_

Tim doesn’t stay the night, but he doesn’t patrol with—of all people—Jason, the two of them reacting to a call and meeting up almost inadvertently. From what he can hear over the comm. link, they actually work together almost well. It’s the kind of working where Jason says they should burst in guns a blazing, and instead of Tim telling him that’s terrible idea (which it is), he uses it as a planned distraction and sneaks around the back.

Dick considers himself a winner when Tim comes around two days later and has some of Alfred’s breakfast. He still sits in that out-of-place position, eyes flickering around as if someone might call him out on the fact that he’s sitting there, with them. Dick somehow thinks even the amount of discomfort he can detect is only scratching the surface, that this strange displacement goes much deeper than Dick has the ability to diagnose.

He is just beginning to feel secure, to feel something like a family when Tim starts to appear for more than one meal a day, Jason constantly leaning over the back of the couch with his seemingly endless supply of cookie—that he has yet to figure out why only Jason gets to have them. Damian, unfortunately, does not grow into his new siblings, instead becoming more and surlier as the days pass.

Dick gets his hopes up on only the second time Tim decides to sleep over, hearing Damian and him in the same room. He stays a respectable distance, aware that Tim can usually hear him a mile away.

“It’s the left side first.” Damian says grumpily.

“He used to do it right-to-left.” Tim replies with an even tone. They sound like their stacking or filing something, Dick can’t tell at this distance.

“He doesn’t anymore.” Damian tells him testily. “You’re doing it wrong.”

“You do it then.” Tim tells him with a muffled sigh.

There is some shifting, and the sound of stacking/filing returns. “I don’t even know why you came back, Drake.”

“I don’t really think it involves you.” Tim says with a slight strain.

“I was happy when you just steered clear. What changed your mind? I liked it better that way.”

“Not that it’s your business, but Bruce wanted me back.”

Damian laughs. “Let me guess, Grayson told you that?” Silence. “Seriously Drake, I had no idea you were that gullible. Father hasn’t spoken a word about you, and he hasn’t expressed that he wants you home, to Grayson or to anyone.”

Dick feels like he’s watching a train wreck, unable to stop it, unable to move, horrified and riveted to the spot. _Damian, no!_

“Whatever.” Tim says, and Dick hopes for a desperate moment that maybe, just maybe, Tim doesn’t believe him. Then the third Robin turns out of the room, facing Dick with heartbreak clear on his face before it flickers away and is snapped shut.

“Dick.” Tim says, completely placid.

“Tim—“ Dick begins helplessly.

Tim tilts his chin, like this just confirmed his suspicions. “You didn’t have to lie, Dick.”

And with that, Tim leaves. He doesn’t come back.

Dick feels absolutely terrible, and he knows it is completely and utterly  _his fault._

[]

Tim manages to not speak or see a single bat for two weeks.

He just feels overwhelming like a  _fool._  The biggest fool in the entire universe. He thought, maybe, that Bruce had given two seconds to think about his existence, and decide he wanted him around, but it was just Dick’s selfish manipulation that he fell for, hook line and sinker. At that thought, he swallows heavily, stuffing away the irrational anger at Dick, because it’s not his brother’s fault. He meant well. But Tim knows the love is superficial, and he knows he can’t dip his toes in the water for too long or he’ll plunge completely back into the family, only to find it’s poison. He’s never a member of their family and it’s so  _foolish_  to ever consider himself belonging in their ranks.

It doesn’t stop the sharp heartbreak in his chest every time he thinks about it.

He needs to do something. He needs to get away from the sticky web he’s trapped himself in while lurking in Gotham. He loves his city—he loves his city more than anything else, actually—but the people inside hurt too much. He packs a bag and gets ready to leave, because he swears if he stands here another moment he’ll explode.

His ears pick up the sound before he can really register what it implies. He speaks blindly. “Dick, not now, okay?”

Dick doesn’t reply, so he turns around, and  _god dammit Bruce is standing right there._

“Did Dick send you?” Tim briskly asks, ignoring the way his heart is beating rapidly in his chest, and the way Bruce is staring levelly at him like he has all the time in the world.

“No.” Bruce replies, with that finality that Tim knows he isn’t lying. “I came to talk to you.”

Tim crosses his arms a little defensively, looking at him as if to say, ‘ _talk, then.’_

“Are you leaving?” Bruce says instead, looking at the bag.

“I haven’t decided yet.” Tim shrugs. “Maybe.”

Bruce keeps looking at him, and Tim doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say.

“Your skills would be appreciated wherever you go, I’m sure.” Bruce says at last, and then adds without a change in tone. “But you would benefit more at the manor.”

Tim then feels like this is happening to someone else. Sure, it’s the number-one-Bruce-way to offer, but it’s actually being spoken to him, right now. Without question. No loopholes, no lies. Tim’s head is spinning a little, he can’t believe that… that Bruce actually cares enough to come to him, to tell him…

He forgets himself, for a moment, and forgets the unspoken rule that if Bruce is offering you something offhandedly, you don’t bring up the real emotions behind it. He speaks in a small, vulnerable voice that he might’ve used twice in his entire life. “You really want me there, Bruce?”

Immediately after he’s spoken, he wants to suck the words back into his mouth. No, no! He  _wasn’t_  just  _vulnerable_ in front of  _Batman._  Tim knows more than ever, that he is a fool. He tries so hard to not be weak in front of anyone, and the only time he decides to do so, it’s Bruce. Tim wonders sometimes if he might be self-destructive.

“I mean, I don’t—“ Tim amends fast, sounding drawn and certain, a mere ghost of weakness.

“I do, Tim.” Bruce says, and Tim actually pales a little, startled by the words. “But if you want to leave, it’s up to you. I won’t stop you.”

Bruce leaves without saying goodbye, but Tim doesn’t mind. He stares at the space where Bruce stood, head lost somewhere else. And then almost an hour later, he picks up his passport, and calls a taxi to the airport.


	5. Chapter 5

Everything in the strange family Bruce Wayne created for himself is based more on things  _unsaid_  than the things that are  _said._

Tim spends three months away from any fingers of contact his family has on him, working by himself in Mexico, then Argentina. He’d thought of going east again, but predictability is a bad niche to have. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but there was plenty to do while he was in the south—crime is never restricted to a geological location—and his brain was sufficiently occupied for those months.

When he finally wraps up every little thing he started since he’d gotten there, he boards a plane. He does this quickly, with no forethought or pre-planning, and flies home. He knows–with every piece of his being–that if he allows himself to, he would never go home.

But cowardice is not the trait of a hero. It’s not the trait he wants on his own shoulders.

While he is away, he honestly can’t tell if he has fallen properly off the map. He isn’t sure if Bruce is still watching his moves, though he thinks he has done well enough to remain out of sight. 

He sits on the plane to Gotham, and meditates. He doesn’t want to think of anything else at the moment. He ignores how meditating feels like moving from one form of cowardice to another, and focuses on his physical body returning home.

How long before his mental body gets home is debatable.

When he lands in Gotham Airport, he steels himself. He digs his nails into his palms and resolutely says to himself, _okay, it’s time to stop being a coward. Right now._

It’s easier said than done, but he determined to try. Timothy Drake-Wayne takes a taxi straight to the Wayne Manor. Inside the cab, sitting alone with his own thoughts to accompany him, his brain tries to catch up with him and force him into panic. Only years of practice shoves down the feeling, and he’s left with a phantom panic, racing heart and shaking fingers.

It feels like there are physical walls blocking the path up to the front door, and he has to push himself through each one. He has a single bag on his shoulder, and this bag is knocked off when Dick tackles him in a hug.

Tim didn’t see him coming, so that’s a surprise. “Oof.” He manages, falling to the stone path with a lot of older brother on top of him.

“Babybird!” Dick cries, kissing him quite violently on the cheek before staring at him with bright blue eyes. “You’re home!”

“I’m home.” Tim replies, a little weakly.

An overjoyed expression settles on Dick’s face, and he kisses Tim’s cheek gratuitously once again.

Then he’s suddenly being lifted to his feet by strong hands, Dick’s grinning face still in the corner of his eye. A fifty-pound weight melts off his chest, leaving him with an almost delirious feather-light step. Dick wants him here.

“Come on, come in, it’s so good that you’re back, I’ve been waiting  _forever!_ Bruce said we had to let you come back on your own—well, you know, in his own way—but anyway—“

Tim gives Dick a pointed look, and his older brother just grins. They step onto the elegant threshold into the manor, and Dick fixes Tim by his shoulder, the grin falling.

“Look,” Dick skims his lip with his teeth for a millisecond. “I get why you went. Just… I missed you, okay?”

“I missed you too.” Tim says, an automatic response before he can consider the words. Dick flashes him a reassuring look, and pulls them in the front door.

[]

“Looks like you decided to grace us with your presence again.” Jason says to him when he’s unpacking, leaning in Tim’s bedroom doorway.

Tim pauses, twisting to look at him. Jason spoke without any tone that’s particularly encouraging, but there’s something in his face that betrays his words. “Hi Jason.” Tim says, trying to give the proper tone to match his.

Jason just smirks, pushing away from the doorway and leaving again.

When Alfred comes and summons him to supper, Tim is given a private smile. Bruce’s eyes flicker approvingly up at his presence at the table, but there’s not an acknowledgement.

All in all, Tim thinks that he’s gotten the best end of the stick. He’d rather not have a fuss anyway. Damian seems content to give him that–all the youngest Wayne does at the sight of him is raise an eyebrow.

Dick is still beaming.

Just like that, he’s home. All of them are home.

[]

Tim finds himself working patrols with—of all people–Jason. Dick lingers around him constantly at the manor, like he’s trying to make up for lost time. Bruce keeps an aura of quiet approval. But, the final piece is Damian.

It’s late on a December night, the air cold and brittle. Tim is looking for a particular book in the manor library, yawning to himself and hiding his fingers in the edges of his sweater sleeves. It’s quite dim between the stacks, Tim squinting at the titles and not finding want he wants. He’s turning a corner to the next stack when he accidently kicks a bag at his feet. It spits the contents onto the clean floor, two books and a handful of papers.

Tim immediately picks up and makes sure the books are okay, placing them back into the bag. The papers are more spread, and he finds himself pausing on one hand-drawn paper in the middle.

_Family Tree_  it reads is tight handwriting.

He sits back a little, surprised. It’s obviously Damian’s, with the tiny hand-drawn  _Damian Wayne_  in the center. But what’s surprising is that Dick, Jason, Cass and  _him_  are included. In the low light, he can see the tiny details put into each drawing.

Not sure how to react, Tim lowers the drawing and picks up the rest of the papers, tidying them and placing them in the bag. He keeps the family tree, examining it carefully and turning it over.

_What they mean to me_  is written across the top. In red pen, a teacher has marked what Damian wrote down.

Tim glances around, wondering if it’s a bad idea to read this. Curiosity wins out.

It says that Dick is someone he trusts, Cass is someone strong and Bruce is someone important to him. But Tim doesn’t mind those, eyes stuttering when he reads that  _Tim is someone I believe in._

Tim stares, dumbfounded.  _What does that mean?_

Slowly, he puts the paper back in the bag. Then he pulls the sweater tighter around himself in the cool atmosphere, glancing at the stacks and deciding he could look for his book tomorrow.

[]

Damian stops him in the hallway the next morning, face drawn and frosty. “You read my homework.” he bluntly greets, looking put-off and stiff.

Tim draws in a breath, not even asking how he knows. “It’s a good family tree.”

His fingers flex, and Damian makes a very distinctly ‘ _not-pleased’_  face. “That was not yours to read.”

He doesn’t attempt to lie, folding his fingers together in front of himself. “It’s still good.”

Damian fumes, but falters just a little, trying to make the next request sound like a snap. “Don’t tell Grayson about what’s on the back.”

“I won’t.” Tim says.

His little brother scuffs the carpet for a second, still mad but flickering his blue eyes up to Tim for a second. “And don’t take yours to heart.”

“I won’t.” he says, but his lips upturn slightly.

Damian huffs, brushing past him. Tim glances over his shoulder, thinking that maybe Damian isn’t as complex as he thinks he is.

He smiles to himself, walking to the library. He feels in place, found, maybe even welcome in the manor for once. No one has to say anything—the things unsaid are much more important anyway. Tim’s always known that. He’ll likely never know what Damian meant when he says that he ‘believes in him’, and Tim doesn’t actually want to know.  Everything unspoken is much sweeter anyway; none of his family has been great with words.

His family. 


End file.
